Hotel Savoy

HOW TO GET FROM SPACE TO PLACE: EPISODE 4 Hotel Savoy ~ Anna Łuczak An Exhibition + Reader Launch with test by Olga Hohmann and an interview with Andrzej Leder Opening 12th May 2022 Fri-Sun, 13-29th May 2022 13:00-18:00 For the 4th Episode of “How to Get From Space to Place” WET are proud to launch Anna Łuczak’s reader “Hotel Savoy” alongside a video installation – which together form an attempt to symbolically ‘get inside' the 1918 novel Hotel Savoy, by the Austrian writer Joseph Roth. They are also attempts to enter the hotel itself , described by Roth in the book, and filmed by Łuczak in the present day: the choice to depict the same place from a distance of a hundred years allowing her to see the parallels between the two realities. The novel is an elegy for a Europe disintegrating and aggregating into small nation states, in which the author could no longer find himself; Roth did not see himself as an Austrian Jew, but as a citizen of the multicultural Habsburg Empire stretching from Vienna to the edge of Russia. On his way back from the front of the First World War, Roth stayed at the eponymous hotel in Łódź, Łuczak’s home town, and encountered the flotsam of Europe at its most existential. The works were prompted by Łuczak’s desire to reflect on experiences connected with moving to the Netherlands in 2005, soon after Poland joined the European Union. Years later, She found the prose of Joseph Roth and the thoughts of cultural philosopher Andrzej Leder to resonate with the consequences of these decisions - both Poland’s and her own. In this reader Łuczak reflects on his work, and all that it has to say about identity, loss, collective trauma and migration. In doing so, she hopes to understand something of the changing political climate of the last decade in Poland. WET is a Rotterdam-based collective and project space for artists’ moving image. We provide a platform for exhibitions, screenings and workshops, with a focus on artworks which challenge existing orthodoxies, and propose alternative historical, political and aesthetic perspectives. We host a monthly online screening programme, accompanied by a podcast. WET also acts as a support structure for both its members and the artists with whom we work, assisting in the production of works through the exchange of labor, equipment and expertise. More information: www.wetfilm.org Works: Hotel Savoy, 3-channel video installation, 6mins (looping), 2022 Credits: A novel by Joseph Roth, 1918 filmed in and around Hotel Savoy, Łódź - Poland, 2018, directed, filmed and edited by Anna Łuczak, Camera assistance: Ghislain Amar, Sound design: Francesco Cimino, Support: Daan Milius, Tim Rutten Hotel Savoy, Reader, Digital print, 200 copies, 2022 Credits: Best Spaetzle in Town: text by Olga Hohmann, Graphic design: Hagen Verleger, proof-reading English: Nick Thomas, proof-reading Polish: Olga Tyszkiewicz Production coordination: Sophie Bates photo documentation: Jakob Forster Install team: WET and Grace Baggott Special Thanks: WET members, Grace Baggott, Maciej Łuczak, Maria Łuczak, Jakob Forster, Natalia Amelia Saied, Sophie Schmidt, Joshua Thies, Hagen Verleger, Olga Hohmann, Olga Tyszkiewicz and Andrzej Leder With the support of Gemeente Rotterdam, CBK Rotterdam, Stichting Droom en Daad, de Hillevliet, and Prins Bernhard Fonds How to Get from Space to Place is an episodic exhibition program by WET for 2021-22, consisting of five core parts with moving image artists from the Netherlands and abroad. The program focuses on the notion of ‘place’ and what that means in the contemporary moment.